Retrofitting Red LED lightbar from Cadillac STS by burkart

11 minute read

Retrofitting Red LED lightbar from Cadillac STS - Cheap DIY 

Compliments of burkart @ nasioc.com

4-29-2012

hey dudes and dudettes

im pretty pleased with my latest LED mod and would like to share it with everybody. i'd love to hear good feedback or questions...

most of this was posted in another thread- just tying it together here.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tommybu...th/7125810299/ 

i found afew cadillac sts's in a junkyard and ripped out the huge long LED center stop lamp. its pretty interesting how it works. basically uses reflectors to siluate a contuniuos band of light. it is actually four long skinny circuit boards, connected by their wiring.

anyway, i put it in my rear glass area- 3m heavy duty double stick taped. i spliced into the spoiler brake light

if interested.. here's more info on the re-purposed cadillac STS light bar - DIY LED taillight behind glass mod.

i snapped some pics of the lightbar parts. it's made up of 4 skinny circuit boards with about 10 LEDs each. these are all linked by their wiring. there are 50 or so lenses that clip on to each LED section of the boards.  

in these new pics with the trunk open, you can see my setup. it is exactly 3 circuitboards wide, so i trimmed off the extra board. (*damn didnt realize how enormous the 91-09 STS/SLS bitches were) - 4 boards.

with the lenses attached, the LEDs are amazing when viewed from behind at traffic level. theyre prismactic.

my setup is two layers of boards, one with the reflector lenses, one without. the OEM reliability of the LEDs gives me confidence that they'll last. i dont recall ever seeing a caddy with its lightbar out, in fact.

THE WHAT:

- replacing or supplementing current taillights with STS LED lightbar. can be retrofitted in many shapes and permutations.  

WHY:

- OEM LEDs dont burn out like crappy amazon or ebay lights. yes, even the fancy ebay/amazon LEDs. here's a spoiler alert: all aftermarket LEDs are total garbage and wont stay lit a month, let alone a lifetime

- stopping light is a good way to personalize vehicle

- long continuous lightbar look - visually lowers car.  

parts needed:
scissors, flathead screwdriver (huge), electrical tape, double sided tape,

...... AND one or two of the long strip LED taillamp CHMSL from a most cadillacs made between 1991 and now. STS SLS pref.

WHEN: takes about 20 mintes once you have the light bar 

WHERE

- salvage yard or used auto parts store, aka u-pull-it, etc. places where you can roam the lot, free to remove any part. they rign you up at the register on way out. usually dirt cheap  

HOW:

- the shroud around the STS taillamp is fiberglass and is a 10-15 minute job to remove. shove in the flathead and pry the painted area away from the plastic red part. keep jacking it away, pull a bit. its ok iuf you break the red plastic piece- you dont really need that anyway.

- once it is loose, snip the two wires and use the flathjead to unhook each of the circuit boards. these are the actual LEDs. keep all the mini plastic lenses.  

- decide the look you want, flat or angled, then position the lightbars behind the rear glass.  

- use double sticky foam tape to mount it.

- wire splice into existing CHMSL.  

goodluck and let me know any questions - share pics if you do it!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tommybu...th/7125810299/

or if afeared of the salvage yard, you could buy one new. this one doesnt fold up as easily as mine tho...

http://www.ebay.com/itm/OEM-Cadillac...071180&vxp=mtr

figured out how to embed pics here. =]

5-9-2012

hey guys,

no love for the LED lightbar? can be installed onto any Rex...

i grabbed another one today from an STS in junk, Wisconsin and took some pictures this time of the removal process.  

i also learned alittle more about how it works. this is really nerdy, admittedly.  

the LEDs are red in the first place, but then listen to all the steps to make it a red beam of light -- when seen from behind...
- in addition to having mini clip on lenses 1-inch away from every 72 LED bulb on the circuit board, the LED circuit boards are mounted at a 45 degree angle pointing toward sky.
- the red light passes through the lenses upward and outward, then reflects off a mirror downward again
- the light is now on its way out-- finally passing through the red plastic piece. this is heavily tinted dark red and has some reflectors in it as well.

also occurs to me: there is no way to change out these 'bulbs' like any other lamp. the whole assembly is a sealed unit, sortof a throwback....

bodes well for their longevity tho

5-10-2012

more pics. this one is complete (w/ red plastic watertight assembly) and i'm trying to sell it on ebay...

6-18-2012

some new pics of this mod

6-19-2012

thanks! not strictly needed but it looks cool in my opinion.  

my original plan was to unplug the stop lamp in the spoiler so braking would look like this:  

7-19-2012

update on this:

i made a shroud out of aluminum tape for this LED light bar in my rear glass area. the LEDs are stick circuitboards though - and the metal tape caused shorts galore.  

since replaced. i dont have good pics of it but here are some. also, my new LED badge bezel

8-1-2012

this ispretty nerdy but i also ued one of the boards in my fireplace.......... wired to computer fan 12v so t goes to sleep w/ computer......

8-2-2012

OKAY! I know that tens of you were waiting for better night pics of this. aquí estân

8-23-2012

@chasewrx bought my extra superflux LED boards and did the install on his WRX sedan. i think it looks pretty good!

if i saw it on the highway, i would think:

8-25-2012

i cruised around ebay for the right product .. and found it for just $99. better / cheaper than i expected.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/05-09-CADILL...sories&vxp=mtr

even better might be this one

http://www.ebay.com/itm/08-09-10-11-...sories&vxp=mtr

10-4-2012

10-29-2012

my lightbar is still going strong and doing great!

to recap: i used 2 cadillac sts 2005 rear light bars, stacked.  

i was at a pick-n-pull last week and found a 2007 cadillac SRX with its lightbar intact. i pried it off and bought it for $20. it is the exact size of the inside of my tailgate window glass.  

if the original lightbar burns out i plan to switch to this one.  

11-17-2012

thanks! yea this SRX one is pretty sweet.  

the old one is still working well .. some new pics from my Nikon- higher resolution than phone phots

11-23-2012

Before:

After: